So i have 3 full 5 gallon gas cans from the end of the boating season (October). My thought was to use them, but i forgot. Do you think the gas is still good? Can i test it? I do not want to waste it, but i do not want to use it if it will cause harm to any engine.

I think if you mix it in with clean gas and you don't have anything to worry about. We fill our tank up before the winter (September) and add Fuel Stabilizer to it, and crank the boat back up in April and its just fine.

After 6 months gas is starting to break down pretty good and you may notice slightly harder starting and sluggish throttle response. It will burn though and no reason to waste it. If it's not going into a high performance or high compression engine just mix with fresh gas and run it. If you have a car or truck that's low compression and burns 87 octane, just dump it in there.

Also I've run gas that's two years old with no problems other than poor throttle response and hard starting. Not ideal but it'll burn. I did once have 20 gallons of 12+ year old gas to get rid of. Looked like hell and smelled like varnish. Pour on the ground and would not evaporate, had to hold a torch to it for several seconds to get it to light and it would go out before burning all of it... So really old gas does go bad.

Jason don't do it, it's not worth it. 15 gallons of gas is about $50. Cost of flushing your tank, fuel system, and possibly injectors if the gas is bad, waaaay more than $50. Fuel these days has a lot more ethonal in it and seperates when it sits. If it's bad and even if you mix it, the boat will not run good AT ALL. Then you may be faced with flushing or cleaning out your fuel system. I wouldn't take that chance over $50

They claim that with ethanol you get phase separation at the 30-45 day point. We leave gas in the boats and sleds for 6 months in the off seasons. I have never had an issue. We only use non ethanol premium and do stabilize.

Thanks everyone. It is premium. I was not going to chance it in the boat. I was going to use it our cars, lawn equipment or the snow blower since they are calling for 7 inches of snow! Never again will I plan my boating season around a large rat they call Phil.

Some of these answers are funny. If the gas was premium and in sealed tanks there is no issue. I have a Chevy Volt, and the car doesn't force you to start burning gas until the gas gets one year old. Took me almost a year to burn 9 gallons. According to some of you, you would think this gas would have killed the car . Do you think everyone that has a winter layaway drains their tanks?

It's pretty easy to test gas. Smell it. If it smells like gas it is good. Closed in a 5 gallon container it has nothing to degrade it. I've actually heard that they can get oil out of the ground and it's probably been in there for 60 million years or so without turning to water.

Oil doesn't have water introduced into it with the ethanol, now does it?????

If there is ethanol there will be phase separation in 30-45 days. Unless 100's of people with PH D's are liars or just plain stupid. Not something people are making up. If its straight gas then its another story.

My car is proof in point. Average age of the gas, which contains ethanol, is at least 6 months. Granted it is in a pressurized system. But if this really were an issue, everyone would be draining their tanks every winter.